Do you optimize for anything besides Google, or is it not worth the effort?

Curious if anyone actually bothers with Bing/DDG separately, or if it's just Google-first for everyone.

I never optimize for Bing but I absolutely think I am missing out a lot from it, just like many other people.

It's mostly out of laziness because I have always said I would set up Bing Webmaster but I never do.

Well, I guess it's because I am more fixated on Google that I haven't wanted to try something else.

---

That said, I’ve stopped treating Bing as an afterthought. The traffic isn’t huge, but it’s usually easier to rank there, so I’ll take it if it comes.

It's definitely still Google first for almost everyone, mostly because Google still controls something like 90% of the global search market.

But Bing actually matters a lot more now, and it's basically all because of AI. Bing powers the backend for ChatGPT search and Microsoft Copilot, so if you want your site cited in those AI answers you need to be indexed in Bing. Plus DuckDuckGo pulls most of its results straight from Bing anyway, so getting into Bing covers DDG too.

SirTop said:

It's mostly out of laziness because I have always said I would set up Bing Webmaster but I never do.

---

Click to expand...

Is it worth a ton of extra effort though? Not really. You don't need a totally separate content strategy. Bing's just slightly more old school and likes exact match keywords and social signals a bit more than Google does, but honestly a solid Google SEO foundation covers most of what Bing wants anyway.

The one extra step you should definitely take is setting up Bing Webmaster Tools and submitting your XML sitemap. Bing's crawler can be a bit slower than Google's, so spoon feeding it your links just makes sure you get into their index and show up in those AI assistants. Beyond that, just keep your main focus on Google.

optimize primarily for Google but I don't ignore Bing or DuckDuckGo Good technical SEO and high quality content tend to perform well across multiple search engines without requiring a completely separate strategy.

Google first is still the only strategy that consistently moves rankings, bing/ddg mostly mirror google signals, so if you nail content quality, relevance, & links, you will rank there too only optimize separately if that traffic is a proven revenue score

For me, Google is the main focus, but I do not ignore other platforms completely. A little extra traffic from other sources is always useful.

SK_LinkBuilder said:

Curious if anyone actually bothers with Bing/DDG separately, or if it's just Google-first for everyone.

Click to expand...

There are journeys here where the member targetted only bing and made good money with it. Please use search button on BHW to filter those threads.

I still do some Bing optimization on sites where the audience fits. A few projects I worked on had 5–10% traffic from Bing without doing anything special. Usually it’s just making sure indexing is clean, titles are reasonable, and the site structure isn’t built only around Google’s quirks. I wouldn’t run a separate campaign for DDG though.

Depends on the niche tbh. If Bing is already bringing some traffic, then yeah I’d put a little more effort into it.

Google is still king among the search engines. If you ask apart from Search engine, Yes Optimize for AI too.

I think Google gets the main focus because of traffic share, but optimizing for others doesn’t hurt.

I wouldn't ignore Bing completely Even a small amount of extra traffic can be worthwhile

SK_LinkBuilder said:

Curious if anyone actually bothers with Bing/DDG separately, or if it's just Google-first for everyone.

Click to expand...

Google is still my primary focus but I also optimize for Bing and AI powered search platforms. Strong technical SEO, quality content, structured data, and a good user experience tend to benefit all serach engine.

SK_LinkBuilder said:

Curious if anyone actually bothers with Bing/DDG separately, or if it's just Google-first for everyone.

Click to expand...

I am pre dominantly google first but I does not think that the other search engines are irrelevant. Many of the basics remain the same so if Bing and DDG start sending me more traffic with very little effort then I will be happy to accept it.

I still think Google deserves most of the focus but I wouldnot completely ignore Bing or DDG if the same SEO work improves visibility across multiple search engines, the extra effort seems worthwhile